Hawaiian Air Says ‘Aloha’ to Brisbane

Hawaiian Airline’s maiden voyage to Australia’s capital city took flight yesterday. The direct route from Honolulu re-opens Brisbane as a gateway to the islands and creates about 41,000 additional seats with this recent expansion.

The crew getting ready to fly to Brisbane. My high school classmate is second from the right, cool!

The inaugural flight departing Honolulu enjoyed a traditional island send-off, complete with live Hawaiian music, hula, a Hawaiian blessing and fresh flower lei upon boarding. Prior to this, Hawaiian offered nonstop daily flights between Sydney and Honolulu. This particular flight to the “Sunshine State,” as Brisbane’s been nicknamed, makes Hawaiian Air the only U.S. carrier to serve Australia’s capital city.

Brisbane’s an ideal landing spot for travelers because it has become somewhat of a central hub for onward travel throughout the country. Also, because the city’s located on Australia’s east coast, where there is lots to see and do. Some iconic sites and attractions include the Great Barrier Reef, world heritage listed rainforests, the iconic Outback territory and leisure destinations of Australia’s Gold and Sunshine Coasts.

When we visited Australia this summer, we flew Hawaiian’s direct flight to Sydney, then drove 10 hours north to the Gold Coast. We could have taken a connecting flight with a charter airline to Brisbane but decided to drive instead. Next time, I’d definitely consider taking this new nonstop route to Brisbane. We ended up not finding much to do on our long drive north, until we got to Byron (about 10 hours later), so it’d be worth the extra cost and flight time to fly directly to Brisbane. Oh well, it was all part of the learning experience!